Neighborhood experience and hoarding disorder

Abstract

Hoarding disorder is a relatively common psychiatric condition with a variety of adverse social and individual consequences. People with hoarding report high rates of loneliness and interpersonal dysfunction; however, little is known about how people with hoarding experience and function within their broader social systems (e.g., neighborhoods and communities). Neighborhood experience mediates the effects of one's environment on mental health outcomes, suggesting that it may be relevant to psychiatric disorders such as hoarding disorder that are accompanied by social dysfunction. Using the All of Us Research Program, the present research explores the neighborhood experience of people with hoarding disorder (n = 64), and how it compares to matched participants without a psychiatric diagnosis (n = 634) and to matched participants with obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD; n = 302). People with hoarding reported significantly higher perceived neighborhood social disorder, neighborhood physical disorder, and everyday discrimination than their matched counterparts. People with hoarding also reported significantly lower perceived neighborhood safety and social cohesion than their matched counterparts. Additionally, perceived daily discrimination was a significant predictor of hoarding disorder relative to participants diagnosed with OCD and control participants. The present results suggest that failure to function within one's broader community may contribute to, result from, and/or be an important treatment target for hoarding disorder.